Section: Editorial

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Editorial Note to Crotonblog Readers:

November 21, 2007

We are experimenting with typefaces that will make the text of Crotonblog more easily readable by readers. Please bear with us while we decide on the proper combination that will assure greater legibility.

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A Practical Plan to Solve Croton’s Water Problems—and End the Additive Controversy

November 14, 2007

An undetermined number of Croton residents are unhappy with the Mayor’s plan to inject chemical additives into Croton’s famously pure water. In the absence of any questionnaire circulated among residents, the exact number of people who are for or against this proposal has not been determined.

Freedom of choice is one of the benefits of democracy. We are free to get a flu shot or to decline to get one. We are free to send our children to public schools, private schools, and church schools or to school them at home. We are free to vote or not to vote, although too many of us are too lazy to show up at the polls.

Crotonblog detects signs indicating that additives are now a done deal. What is so annoying about the present controversy is that freedom of choice is being taken from the residents of Croton and placed in the hands of three elected officials, none of whom are health professionals or biochemists.

If a national bottling company were to approach Croton with a proposal to bottle Croton’s water, this village would fall over itself to facilitate such a venture. It has even considered—although not very seriously—the idea of bottling Croton water itself. A bottling company, we might add, would only be interested in Croton water before chemical additives were injected into it.

It so happens that the presence of chemical additives has no effect on the human body in water used for dishwashing, clothes washing, bathing and showering, even tooth brushing because no water is ingested in the process. Crotonblog has devised a plan so beautiful in its simplicity and practicality that the Schmidt administration would be foolish to turn it down.

Under Crotonblog’s plan residents could obtain “old-fashioned” Croton water without derailing the proposal to inject additives into the water. Because the additive program requires a separate building, there would be ample opportunity for the village to divert water before the chemical additives are injected.

Continue reading "A Practical Plan to Solve Croton’s Water Problems—and End the Additive Controversy."

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Mayor Schmidt Decisively Takes Charge: 'We'll Look Into It'

November 9, 2007

You say you want a doggie park,
A place for dogs to run and bark,
And a chance to canoodle
With a cute little poodle?
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

You say that the alley behind Zeytinia
Smells like a street in old Abyssinia?
You can stop all your moaning
And grumbling and phoning,
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

You say your water’s brown?
Well, so do others here in town.
Instead of new mains
To get rid of the stains,
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

Our parking lot’s a great place
For Olympic swimmers to race.
If your car’s wet inside
And you’re fit to be tied,
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

You think your taxes are high?
And those sewer fees are a lie?
Then just you wait
‘Till next year in ’08,
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

With empty storefronts galore,
Who would want to open a store?
Merchants let out a yelp
But the Mayor’s no help.
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

You say that you want no zinc
In the Croton water you drink?
Don’t believe what we say,
Please just go away.
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

Maria’s secret e-mails are a sham
And her advice not worth a damn.
I just hide them away
And to complainers I say,
Here’s what we’re gonna do:
“We’ll look into it.”

Verse by Croton’s Own Poet Laureate

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The North County News 'Goof of the Week'

November 7, 2007

The North County News has done it again. Their sloppy reporting this week calls attention to their continuing need for accurate fact checking. In a story detailing the history of the affordable housing project in Croton to be known as Symphony Knolls, reporter Adriane Tillman describes the property as having been owned by “Levenia McClure who lived in the house at 15 Mt. Airy Road into her 80s.”

For the record, Ms. McClure’s name was Levina—not Levenia. A genteel lady who served juice and cookies at parties for her pupils, Levina McClure figures in Home Before Dark, Susan Cheever’s memoir of her father, John Cheever. Both father and daughter took piano lessons from Levina McClure. One of John Cheever’s first stories written in Westchester was titled “The Music Teacher.”

Also for the record, Levina McClure was born October 27, 1911, and died June 1, 2003. This would have made her almost 92 at the time of her death. By our reckoning, it can quite accurately be said that she lived into her 90s.

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Croton Blows It, Again: Flooding Swamps Train Station Parking Lot

November 6, 2007

Like a beaming first-time grandfather, village manager Rick Herbek rounded out last night’s whirlwind 45-minute board of trustees meeting with accolades galore over Croton’s hi-tech weather station mounted atop its DPW garage.

Flooding at the Croton-Harmon train station commuter parking lot on November 6, 2007.

The instrumentation includes a live webcam pointed directly at the flood-prone lot’s sections G and H. An imposing installation of meteorological instruments measures weather conditions and reports live weather data to a public village web page.

Fancy stuff, to be sure. In addition to contacting parking lot customers by e-mail, the village purchased a solar-powered roadside alert sign to warn commuters of potential upcoming bad weather conditions. Apparently village officers pay no attention to the impending disasters regularly signaled by its own weather equipment.

Continue reading "Croton Blows It, Again: Flooding Swamps Train Station Parking Lot."

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All Dressed Up and No Place to Go: North County News Throws in the Towel

November 4, 2007

Ever since The North County News set up a blog with the avowed purpose of taking readers away from Crotonblog, we have been looking back over our collective shoulders at this upstart. Calling itself The Blog Cabin, a name more appropriate for the organization of Gay Republicans, it has been so far behind Crotonblog the simile “eating our dust” could hardly be applied.

In creating this mean-spirited blog, The North County News wrote that “in addition to our backyard of Yorktown, we instinctively knew the second logical community to use as a cornerstone is Croton.” Sounding more like a pompous Fourth of July oration, The North County News also wrote, “The good people of Croton are in dire need of a virtual gathering place that respects the democratic diversity of opinion and the baseline integrity of full disclosure, namely, posters not afraid to sign comments with their full legal identity.”

The newspaper and its blog then proceeded to attack Crotonblog for allowing anonymous comments, a time-honored practice with a history going back to the anonymous Federalist Papers and even earlier. The authors of the Federalist Papers later were revealed to be Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and Westchester’s own John Jay, all founding fathers of our democracy.

Crotonblog became so tired of these snide attacks on our tolerance of blogging anonymity, we began to read The North County News carefully and catalog its errors. Only after we published a slew of its serious errors of fact, history and geography with the suggestion that the newspaper’s editor would be better advised to tend to his knitting and concentrate on newspaper publishing, did the attacks cease.

It is no tribute to that newspaper’s journalistic “instincts” to reveal that their “Yorktown blog” attracted the less-than-astronomical number of only two user comments since its inception in April of this year. During the same period The North County News’s imitative competitor of Crotonblog attracted 330 comments. The only problem with that statistic is that almost all 330 comments were made by the same half-dozen people, making it look like the product of an inbred West Virginia community.

Continue reading "All Dressed Up and No Place to Go: North County News Throws in the Towel."

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North County News Still Can't Get Its Facts Right

October 30, 2007

We hate to keep criticizing the North County News for errors it makes in its news reporting. If it hopes to extend its circulation to areas far beyond its headquarters in Yorktown, it owes the readership it seeks a much higher level of accuracy.

In a piece entitled “Croton board reconsiders water additive” in the October 10 issue of the North County News, its reporter Adriane Tillman wrote, “The village wants to add the chemical (zinc orthophosphate) to the water to reduce corrosion of the pipes that are leaching copper and lead into the water and causing brown water.”

Crotonblog would point out that it is not copper and lead leached into Croton’s water that cause “brown water,” but rather the archaic design of the water distribution system that leaves some households located on dead-end stubs—water mains in which water tends to stagnate and cause the Village’s cast-iron water mains to rust.

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Back from the Brink, Again

October 16, 2007

Once again wiser heads prevailed at Monday night’s (Oct. 15) village board meeting, October 15. A series of impassioned speeches by citizens revealed that they were both concerned and confused about the proposal to add chemicals to Croton’s water. Unfortunately, instead of achieving clarity, the issues become more clouded with each successive meeting.

Major Complaints
A principal concern of speakers was that the Village had not publicized the issue of chemical additives enough. For his part, the Mayor insisted that wide publicity had been given in the past to the issue. An examination of published materials shows this to be untrue. The 2006 Water Quality Report, for example, mentioned the Chazen Group, but said that it had completed “a report on the feasibility of a corrosion control system to help alleviate complaints about discolored water, to lower lead and copper levels, and to help prolong the life expectancy of the water mains and service lines throughout the Village.” Note that nothing is said about additives.

Crotonblog would point out that postponing a vote on the question of chemical additives to still another board meeting is simply not a satisfactory reaction. If the Village were as proactive as it claims to have been, it would have scheduled an information meeting long ago at some place like the high school auditorium at which residents could gather and thresh out their concerns.

Speaker after speaker also implored Village board members to find a solution to the Village’s water-main problems, one that did not involve adding substances that might have a potentially deleterious effect on the health of residents, especially their children.

The Village’s Double-barreled Quandary
At the meeting, it quickly became obvious that the Village is facing two problems:

1. Corrosion of the Village’s own water mains, largely made of cast iron and subject to rusting from standing water caused by stubs at the ends of dead end-streets; and

2. A separate problem caused by the use in older Village homes of lead and copper pipes with lead-bearing solder joints.

The first thing the Village should do to give residents a handle on the problem is to exhibit a map showing the dates when the various Village water mains were laid beneath Village streets. Before the Mayor again uses scare tactics and assures residents that a water main-replacement program is financially unfeasible, the Village should demonstrate that it is aware of the magnitude of the problem and estimate the future cost of replacing aged mains.

The Village’s water emerges from Croton’s wells carrying no lead or copper. Nor does it pick up either of these metals in its journey through Village water mains. It is only when the water leaves the Village’s distribution system and enters each home’s pipes that a potentially dangerous situation arises.

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What If They Are Wrong? A Guest Editorial

October 13, 2007

In the classic film “Casablanca,” Capt. Renault (played by Claude Rains) asks self-described saloonkeeper Humphrey Bogart, “What in heaven’s name brought you to Casablanca?” Bogart’s answer is, “My health. I came here for the waters.” The Captain looks puzzled. “The waters? What waters? We’re in the desert.” Bogart shrugs. “I was misinformed.”

Each year as many as 98,000 Americans die because of medical errors by trained health care professionals. Surprisingly, this number is greater than the numbers who die every year from highway accidents, breast cancer or AIDS. No one will ever know how many die because of errors by nonprofessionals, including well intentioned but uninformed bureaucrats.

Following scant public discussion about options or effects on humans or pets, Croton residents are discovering that the composition of their water may soon be altered with additives. But what if the assurances of product safety offered to the mayor and trustees by additive proponents turn out to be wrong? Given the failure to investigate potential dangers and alternative courses of action, a reasonable person might ask: Which of you who are about to vote on the upcoming resolution is satisfied that the issues have all been thoroughly explored?

Let me stipulate that I believe Mayor Schmidt and the four trustees who will be voting Monday evening are sincere in their desire to do what is right. But what if they are wrong in accepting the assurances of the people who are trying to sell this additive program to the village? Other communities have taken the same advice, they argue. Should that alone sway Croton’s decision? New York City’s water is drawn from the Catskills, but it is so pure the state does not require it to be filtered. Neither does Croton’s water require filtration. The city does not add zinc orthophosphate to its water.

Mayor Schmidt is a licensed health professional. As a Doctor of Chiropractic, he is required to have detailed knowledge of human anatomy and particularly of the skeletal and nervous systems. I cannot imagine him making a diagnosis based on evidence as sketchy and anecdotal as that offered in support of this additive proposal. The four trustees include a steamfitter, a former IBM employee, a railroad executive, and a housewife-author and mother of four young children. None has any specialized knowledge in the areas of water chemistry or health. Will their consciences be clear if they vote to move ahead in the face of skimpy, incomplete research?

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A Simple Solution to the Impasse over Croton's Water

October 9, 2007

Ever since the Mayor’s scheme to adulterate Croton’s highly touted water with chemical additives was put forward, Crotonblog has been hoping someone would come forward with a solution. Suddenly it dawned on us! There is an uncomplicated way to give village residents a voice in their own future.

A Questionnaire Is the Answer
New York State law rules out a referendum in this case. But a questionnaire would be an entirely legal way to ascertain residents’ attitudes toward additives—one with plenty of precedent, and an eminently fair method of measuring public opinion.

As we all know, Croton is comfortable with questionnaires—in fact, Croton loves questionnaires. Consider these examples: To find out whether residents wanted changes in the Zoning Ordinance, Croton sent out a questionnaire that told the village what it wanted to know. To find out whether residents wanted a Community Center, and what facilities it should offer, Croton sent out a questionnaire and gathered the desired information.

But did Croton’s officials make any effort to ascertain residents’ opinions about injecting chemical additives into Croton’s water? No, Mayor Schmidt made absolutely no attempt to discover residents’ feelings. His actions say plainly, “Who gives a damn about what the people want?” To this we say, “Just a minute, Mr. Mayor. You work for us—not the other way around.”

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